Snapshots
by LoveFromShinola
Summary: Hannibal and Clarice, years on from the ending. After leaving together for sunny climes, they are enjoying the life they both always wanted.


**AN:**

**I decided to write a little piece – a one-shot – on Hannibal and Clarice a few years after the Chesapeake. I have yet to read the book Hannibal but I do know what happens at the end is different to what happens in the film. I'm going with my own version. It is film-verse, except at the end Clarice leaves with Hannibal. And they are in Buenos Aires at this point.**

She took his hand…and began a new life.

_Three years later_

Clarice rose, the day after Teatro Colon, stretching and satiated. It was irregular to see that Hannibal wasn't in bed beside her. Shaking her head to clear the fogs of sleep, she slipped from under the silken sheets and put on her robe. Tying it, she wandered through the house, ears adjusting to a woken state, until she heard the sound of soft music. The tinkling, methodical notes of a piano. With a sleepy smile, she headed in the direction of the sounds, trailing her hand across the wall. Knowing that feigning stealth would do her little good, she strode purposefully into the room and strung her arms around her husband's neck.

'Good morning.' She greeted, bright and airy.

'Good morning.' He answered, and for an instant she was back in the basement, seeing him behind that glass for the very first time.

'Breakfast?' she questioned, laying a kiss at the tip of his ear. Always for the element of surprise, in an instant he had ceased to play. Twisting on the stool, he caught her by the hips and she landed, rather gracefully, on his knee. Within less than a second, he was on her. His lips crushing against hers, his hands moving down her body and into her robe. Clarice responded with equal fervor, despite still being drowsy from sleep. When the embrace ended, she pulled away breathless. He as usual, looked perfectly unaffected. Only his eyes, those maroon irises, told her that any kiss with her left him far from feeling ordinary.

'Is _that _supposed to be breakfast?' she joked, raising an eyebrow.

'Not at all. Shall we eat on the terrace?'

Clarice got to her feet, taking his hand and pulling him up with her.

'Sure. I'll help prepare.'

_A year on_

In the spring, four years after their escape, their daughter was born. Mischa. Clarice had insisted and Hannibal had not tried to deny her. It was true that he had never been one for deep emotions. His parents' deaths, the loss of his sister, the complete destruction of what had once been a happy childhood had left him with little room for it. In Lady Murasaki he had been seeking a love he would never find, a love that neither she nor he had felt. Yes, they had cared for one another. But love, like he felt for Clarice, was on an altogether different level. Now, married and a father, emotion had taken on a new face. No longer was he incarcerated, expected to act the monster. He would not be scorned for an honest smile or a gesture of love. He did not have to present the face that people expected of him. With his wife and his daughter he was the man he might have been, had life not dealt him the blows it did.

_Two years later_

When he entered their bedroom that night, he saw a common sight. He'd stayed back to finish reading, and so when he entered, there they were. Clarice, red hair fanned out across the pillow, turned on her side. Her arm draped across his side of the bed, seeking the familiarity of his warmth. She was as beautiful as she'd always been. And there, nestled into her side, was Mischa. She had her mother's hair and her father's eyes, his intelligence and yet her love for the lesser things in life: a cup of coffee at a roadside café, a burger, non-label clothes. At just two years old, she was half of the centre of his universe. Shrugging off his clothes he laid them across a chair and slipped beneath the covers. Immediately, Clarice's unconscious mind felt the shift, and she laid across his chest.

Mischa awoke.

'Daddy?' she voiced, half-yawning, soft and tired.

'I'm here. Go back to sleep my darling.' He reached across his wife to stroke her hair.

'Goodnight, Daddy.'

'Goodnight, my Mischa.'

_Two years later_

It was a warm summer day, the kind best spent with family, and Clarice lay on a lounger in their back yard, soaking up sun. Her alabaster skin hadn't darkened much since coming to sunnier climes, but she held out hope. A giggle brought her out of her reverie, and she looked up and smiled. Mischa and Hannibal were in the pool, and as she floated across on an inflatable, Hannibal walked next to her. Evidently, something he'd said had amused her. Life lead a steady, even pace. No changes, not big. They were still fugitives. It irked her sometimes, and Hannibal too, though he'd never admit it, that they couldn't give Mischa stability. She was four now, and since her birth they had yet to move. Moving would mean a new name, something that neither of them wished to enforce on their daughter.

Though life was steady, it was also bizarre. To wake as Mrs Lecter, though not in name, was a surreal experience daily. She often awoke believing her life for the last eight years or so seemed like a dream. The FBI agent, running off with the serial killer. It didn't get much more fantastical. But even the darkest of hearts have love and Hannibal was no exception. He loved Mischa, that she knew. He loved her, that she knew too. Life wasn't perfect. Life never is.

But, as she watched her daughter playing, happy with her father, loved, content and for the moment, safe, life couldn't get much better.

_Two years later_

Mischa was five and they were still in Argentina. She was ridiculously smart. She could play instruments, speak languages…it was insane. _No _five year old should be that intelligent. At least, that was what Clarice thought. Today, however, had been her sixth birthday. Clarice sat on her bed, stroking back her hair, soothing, wondering what new things her baby girl would learn this year. And how long she would stay her baby girl.

'Clarice?' Hannibal asked from the doorway. She was too used to his silence to jump. She turned to him and all of a sudden, in the harsh light of their daughter's night light, he seemed so old. He _was_ old. She was suddenly reminded of the thirty years that separated them and all at once it seemed less a problem and more a chasm, down which either one or both of them were sure to fall. In an uncharacteristic display of high emotion, she crossed the room, forgetting stealth, and flung herself into his arms. It was a credit to his strength that his stance did not waver:

'What is it, Clarice?'

'I love you.' She whispered, holding back a sob.

'I love you too. But I knew that. What is it really?'

She pulled back.

'I just…' she looked at him, and saw that look in his eyes he kept only for her and Mischa. 'I had – mortality issues.'

'Not for you, I think.'

Her silence was his answer.

'I'm not going anywhere, Clarice. Not now, not next week. Granted, you're not a child. I'm older than you by a significant amount. In the future. But, now? I'm healthy. I'm not going anywhere.'

She smiled and he kissed her brow.

'Now, bed?'

She nodded.

'Bed.'

**AN:**

**What'd you think? Tell me, even if you think it's rubbish Thanks xx**


End file.
